How Not to Fall in Love
by faeven
Summary: Years of unrequited love have weakened Sasuke's will to keep chasing. But after a few mistakes and a few good decisions, things might just turn out alright. Sasuke's POV, lemons, AU.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: I don't own these characters, though if I did, I'd write them a happier past and future. Hope you like it.**

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I don't know what finally made me cave in and say yes. She had been hounding me for years, which hadn't changed recently, so it couldn't be that. I was just as single as I had always been, so it wasn't that either. And I sure as hell hadn't started to have feelings for her.

I thought, maybe, it was the party her roommate had planned with my roommate in order to get us together. That had to be it. Since it couldn't be my feelings about her that changed, it had to be my feelings about him.

Anyone who has been around me long enough will tell you that I am an Uchiha to the core: composed, intelligent, confident (if not sometimes haughty) and distant. As such, I would never be seen at one of those fuck-it-all keggers hosted by the frat houses, which is why my lazy roommate, Shikamaru, had conspired with Ino to host a party in our off-campus apartment with the hopes of getting me and Sakura together. Except, when I say conspired, I mean Ino had nagged Shikamaru, who thought it would never work, for so long that with a sigh of "so troublesome" he had relented and let Ino plan the whole thing.

Therefore it was with a scowl that I stepped out of my room, where I had been attempting to ignore the pulsing music and inebriated yells of my friends, and into the living room.

"Yo, Uchiha! Leaving your sanctuary?"

"Hn." I grunted at Kiba before hugging the wall on the way to the kitchen. On my way I heard voices call my name, to which I answered with a slight raise of my left hand. My right fumbled in my back pocket for my pack of Marlboros.

I was looking down as I entered the kitchen with an unlit cigarette between my lips, searching my pockets for my lighter. I bumped into something soft and looked up into a pair of almost unnaturally blue eyes.

"Hey – hic – Sasuke!" I lurched forward as Naruto greeted me with a slap on the back.

"Naruto."

"Sasuke. Hey! Sasuke! I didn't know you smoked! That's bad for you, you know?" For years I had never let him see me smoke before, but since this was my apartment, I had forgotten about it. He came even closer, as if worried I'd die right then and there, before I heard the click of a lighter beside me.

I looked over to find a girl with short pink hair holding the light for me, blushing. I bent over, realizing that she had probably been carrying that lighter around for me all night at the insistence of Ino, pulled on my cigarette as it took flame, and slowly exhaled towards the ceiling. I loosened my scowl in Sakura's direction as a thank you before finally answering Naruto.

"Drinking until you've blacked out isn't?" I walked towards the light switch to flick on the overhead fan.

"Sakura-chan," I heard Naruto stage whisper behind me, "Does Sasuke hate me? Ne, Sakura-chan?" Turning around after mixing myself a Bloody Mary, I saw Naruto had his arm around Sakura, but was looking at me unwaveringly with tears forming in his eyes. When he saw I was watching, he immediately burst into a huge grin, ran up to me, kissed me on the cheek, returned to Sakura to giver her a peck, too, and skipped off into the living room, apparently bumping into the tangle of Ino, Lee, Ten Ten and Kiba playing Twister on the floor. I heard them all laugh as they fell over.

"Haha, Naruto, you're such an idiot!" Kiba yelled. Such an idiot. While ruminating on the many facets of Naruto's idiocy, I felt a small, softhand grab my wrist.

"Let's go join everyone, Sasuke."

As the night wore on, I sat on the armchair smoking, only moving to refill my drink a few times. The extreme craziness had dissipated for the moment, with Lee and Neji arm wrestling at the kitchen table while Ten Ten cheered them on. Kiba and his girlfriend, Hinata, were talking with Shino, Shikamaru, Chouji and Ino, an abandoned game of Beer Pong behind them on the Ping-Pong table. Sakura leaned happily against my legs while sitting on the floor.

"Where's Naruto?" Sakura's sudden discovery of Naruto's absence caught everyone's attention. "Naruto?" He appeared from the kitchen with an empty vodka bottle and a huge grin plastered on his plastered face.

"Truth or Dare!" he giggled, landing on the floor with a thud. Though we were all a few years into college, Truth or Dare remained a highlight of our parties. However, my eyes were still trained on the empty vodka bottle. I had only used it ten minutes earlier to refill my Bloody Mary, and it had been only half empty.

As everyone gathered around, eager to relish in one another's discomfort, I growled low, surprising myself that I chose to comment, "Naruto… what did you do with my vodka?" I scowled at him while smoke unfurled through my nostrils.

"Eh? Oh, oh. The tequila bottle is empty, but it's square, but I thought you'd had enough of your girly drinks, so I brought you this!" Simultaneously insulted that he said I drank girly drinks and surprised that he brought me a replacement, I grabbed the frosting beer bottle from Naruto's outstretched hand. I had only had four drinks so far, and as I rarely got drunk and hadn't planned on it tonight, the fact that his logic was lacking and half a bottle of vodka was still missing did not go unnoticed by me.

I let it go as Ino, ever the bossy one, began. "Okay! Here are the rules! No take-backs on truths or dares! You can't put yourself in the dare! Couples do not have to make out with anyone else—"

"—Unless they want to!" interjected Naruto.

"Unless they want to," continued Ino, "but must be willing to make out with each other!" Hinata blushed, while Kiba, behind her, smiled stupidly at Naruto, who gave him a thumbs-up.

A few rounds in and I had swapped spit with Ten Ten, Ino and, strangely, Shino (whose mouth I don't think I'd ever really seen before); Kiba was stuck the rest of the night in only his boxers, while a very red Hinata was stuck next to him (why she chose "dare" nobody knows); Neji had to fake a "youthful" confession to Lee; and Ino had dared Shikamaru and Sakura to swap clothes and personalities for the rest of the night. As such, Shikamaru wore 3-inch heels, a red halter-top and denim shorts that even his thin frame barely fit into, while Sakura wore loose khaki shorts cinched as tight as possible around her narrow waist and a black wife-beater.

Sakura's spin of the bottle landed on me, and I let out the faintest of sighs escape as I said, "Dare." The first truth people always asked single people was who they liked, and I would not have answered that for the world. Sakura furrowed her brow in thought, obviously unhappy that she couldn't dare me to kiss her, when Ino crawled over to her from across the circle and whispered in her ear. It did not bode well for Sasuke Uchiha. They giggled.

"Alright, Sasuke!" Sakura began before Ino's tut-tutting made her realize she dropped character, and rephrased, "Uchiha, I know it's, like, so troublesome—"

"I do not say 'like'" Shikamaru interrupted. Another tut-tut from Ino, who was clearly just enjoying messing with them, and he sighed, "No way, Sakura, I so do not say like!"

Ignoring the exaggeration of her speech patterns, Sakura continued. "It's troublesome, but… make out with Naruto, uh, Uzumaki!" I should have known. At this point, Naruto had made out with almost everyone (some of them not because of dares) and even dry-humped a boxer-clad Kiba, so he didn't hesitate, but my impassive mask cracked momentarily as Naruto got off the floor and wove towards me, oblivious to my nerves.

He straddled my lap, his jeans making that uncomfortable noise against the leather. Catcalls from Kiba prompted Naruto to begin, but I guess the beers Naruto had kept feeding me took their toll, because before he could begin, I did. I kept my cigarette-holding hand safely away on the other side of the armrest, while my other hand ran up the back of Naruto's shirt and into his blonde hair, noticing for the first time how fine and soft it was. I brought his head forward into a kiss.

The top lip was wet and slightly sticky from Sakura's alcoholic lemonade he had been stealing sips of, but the bottom one dry. I licked it before parting the pair with my tongue. Just as our tongues met, I pulled back and sucked on his bottom lip. I don't know how long I teased him like that, letting our tongues touch before moving somewhere out of reach, like the salty dip behind his ear or the delicate skin under his jaw. My free hand found his ass and I put my it into his pocket before squeezing. I began to kiss him for real, finally, letting his tongue and mine intertwine and explore the ridges of one another's mouths. About five minutes in, it dawned on me as the ember of my cigarette crept towards my fingers that I had done my dare, and that going any further would arouse suspicion, or at least discomfort in my peers. I pulled away and smirked at Naruto, who opened his eyes panting slightly.

"Damn, Sasuke! You're lucky I'm not gay or I'd be all over you!" My smirk morphed into a scowl.

"Hn."

In the end, I had also made out with Sakura, though substantially less passionately than with Naruto, as a calculated last dare of the night by Ino. I woke up with her again leaning against my legs, now sleeping. I shifted to get up, putting my hands behind her back and resting her against the chair. My vision spun as I brought my head up. I shuffled to my room, hung over and still half asleep. I turned the knob and the door didn't open. I tried again. The frustration woke me up a bit and I tried harder. I grabbed the key, which mysteriously hadn't slipped out of my pocket and gotten wedged in the leather armchair like it always does, and stuck it in the lock. As I did, I heard a sleepy murmur from the bedroom. My bedroom.

I pushed open the door and saw two blonde heads poking out of my black sheets. I walked towards the bed silently and looked down at Naruto before punching him in the face. The smack and Naruto's yell woke up Ino, and apparently most everyone else in the apartment.

"Get out," I seethed, voice even and eyes glaring, "get out now." Ino, fortunate enough to be clothed, ran out of the room. Naruto sat in my bed stupidly before I grabbed him by the shoulders and threw him onto the floor naked. "Out!"

It was the first time Naruto, or anyone besides Shikamaru, for that matter, had heard me yell. He took notice fast, and grabbed his boxers, jeans and t-shirt before running out of the room. I slammed the door after him and stared at my bed for a few minutes. I could hear voices whispering behind me as people started to file out, asking about what had just happened. My eyes fell on Ino's bra, which lay across my desk as if it had been flung there in the heat of the moment. I walked to it, picked it up, walked to the door and was about to chuck it against the farthest wall when I found myself almost nose to nose, well, more like her chin to nose with Sakura.

"Sasuke—"

"You can give this to Ino." I handed her the bra.

"Sasuke, please, calm down!"

"You're annoying, get out."

"Sasuke…" her eyes started to tear before she looked up in a moment of epiphany and slapped me across the face. "Sasuke, I don't know if it's because you have a crush on Ino, or that you didn't want your room messed up, or… I don't know! But you don't have to take it out on me." Her voice was surprisingly calm towards the end. Meanwhile, her slap had brought back my Uchiha stoicism and while I looked down at her, revealing nothing, she continued, "I care about you, you know? I… I think maybe you should find somebody to care about, too. It might help you relax."

I took the bait. If my heart couldn't be satisfied, I'd distract myself until I no longer cared. I had waited like this long enough. "Okay."


	2. Chapter 2

"I don't know why you're putting yourself through the trouble," Shikamaru responded to my entrance into the kitchen. It was 6:30 and he ate cold pop-tarts, too troublesome to warm, and glanced at my clothes. In preparation for my one-month with Sakura, I wore a dark blue dress shirt with a white v-neck underneath and black pants. He sighed. "I don't know why I bother."

"Then don't say anything," I advised with a trademark Uchiha scowl. Shikamaru, lazy fucking genius that he is, realized soon after becoming my roommate freshman year that I had no interest in women. He also knew my heart warmed only on the inside, and then only to Naruto, whom I had known since middle school.

"It's only going to be more trouble."

"Hn." With that, I grabbed my cigarettes and lighter from the counter and lifted a hand in parting.

Sakura's black slinky dress dipped down on her chest to reveal her pale cleavage, the sight of which had caught many a man's eye around the restaurant, but my own gave it not more than a passing glance. Sakura didn't seem to notice my disinterest, because she was all smiles in between sipping her Riesling, eating her salmon and feeding me small pieces, which I accepted in the spirit of being a "good" boyfriend.

I had planned for this dinner to be a rerun of every other date with Sakura: a kiss upon greeting, holding hands across the table while we waiting for our food, eating, drinking, bringing her to her dorm and kissing her goodnight. Because it was our one-month, I had also consented to buying her a gift, which I slid across the table towards her as soon as the waiter had cleared our empty plates. For obvious reasons I had never been very affectionate with Sakura, and she seemed both delighted and surprised to receive a gift from me.

"Can I open it?"

"That's why I pushed it towards you." I smiled faintly, wishing to get caught up in the mood like a normal 22-year-old guy. I watched her slide her finger between the seams in the silver wrapping paper and carefully unfold it without the slightest rip. She held the bare box for a moment, glancing at me quickly, and then opened it.

"Oh, Sasuke!" she blushed. She lifted the silver necklace out, resting the leaf pendant on her fingers as she inspected it under the light. "Help me put it on!" I stood to crouch next to her, deftly clasping the necklace as she held it around her neck. I didn't dislike Sakura. In fact, she had begun to grow on me, as far as a woman could. She was sweet but tough in the right moments, and I respected her for that.

With a real smile, I stood up and returned to my seat.

At her dorm, she held onto my shoulder as our lips parted. "Hey, Sasuke…" She paused for a moment, and then began again. "Sas—"

"Sasuke!" I looked down the hall and saw a blonde head coming out of a dorm room. Just as Naruto began to approach us, I heard a call from inside the room he just left.

"Naruto… where are you going?" the faceless girl whined.

"Gotta take a leak!" Instead of heading towards the toilet, Naruto jogged towards us with a grin. "S'been a while, Sasuke, Sakura-chan!" My heart started to quicken but I kept my face blank.

"Hey, Naruto." Sakura gave him a quick hug before returning to my side and latching onto my arm.

"Oh yeah, I forgot you guys were together! Ha, Sasuke, I thought you'd never get laid!"

"Hn," was all I could muster. Sakura responded by trying to knee him in the groin, but he escaped and headed towards the bathroom laughing.

When I looked down at Sakura, she was almost as red as Hinata on a bad day. She and I had yet to consummate our relationship. We stood like that for a few moments before whatever girl Naruto was with tonight (apparently this time a drunk one) began to whine, "Naruto! Come back! The bed's getting cold!" My stomach clenched.

"What were you trying to stay before?" I tried to distract myself from thoughts of a sexually engaged Naruto.

"Oh, um… it's just that…" My patience was at its limit.

"It's just what?" I snapped, immediately regretting it as I heard Naruto run out of the bathroom calling to his girl. I reduced my glare to a lower intensity and put my hand on her bare upper arm.

"It's just… Ino said she'd be out for the night, so I thought maybe you'd like to come in?" My eyes darted to Naruto's door before shrugging my shoulders.

"Sure, whatever."

Sakura's excitement overwhelmed my lack thereof and we entered her room. The first room split off at the right and the back into their bedrooms. Sakura led me by the hand to the one in the back, keeping her eyes down in what I assumed was happy embarrassment. I knew what was coming, but I was so sexually frustrated and convinced of my own apathy that I let it happen.

Sakura was surprisingly dominant at first, though between the two of us it was no wonder why she was the eager one. We lay in the bed in our underwear after she had done what would have been a sexy striptease for most men and had removed my shirt. I had taken care of my pants, trying to force any enthusiasm out of myself that I could. This is where it got tricky. I had never had sex with a woman. Sure I'd felt her breasts and touched her intimately but this was different. I needed a cigarette break, but I'm not an idiot.

On top of me on the bed, she leaned forward and took off from where we had left before I had found my body enshrined in a puffy pink comforter. Her kisses trailed along my neck, finding my sensitive parts next to my Adam's apple and along my collarbone. My body reacted instantly—I hadn't masturbated for a while and it was itching to let go. Just wanting to get this done so I could feel at peace physically, I moved my hands from the pink hair above me to the back of her bra. She giggled as I fumbled. Soon I got fed up and pulled it up over her small, pert breasts and blushing face.

I rolled her over and pulled off her underwear and my own in a matter of seconds. Returning to my newfound position above her, I pinned her arms above her head with one hand and began to unroll the condom onto my cock.

"Sasuke—" she began, fear tinting her arousal. I shut her up with a kiss and used the hand not pinning her arms to spread her labia and guide the source of my irritation into her. Despite the apprehension that had begun to creep onto her flushed face, she was wet and bit her lip when I entered her.

The only interruption was when I threw one of her legs over each shoulder midway. I orgasmed silently except for a quiet grunt at the beginning. Still inside her, I fell on top of her and buried my head in her shoulder, her hair itching my nose. I felt my weight start to constrict her breathing so I sat up and pulled out. I stood and removed the condom, tied it and tossed it in a wastebasket I had noticed earlier. Sakura's eyes, half-open, watched me as I pulled on my boxers and pants.

"Sasuke—"Again I didn't let her go further. I looked at her and my heart fell, and landed somewhere near my stomach.

"Sakura, I… I'm sorry, I just…" She opened her eyes wide to this uncharacteristic apology. I just wanted to get out of there. I pulled on my white v-neck before giving her a last look and leaving the room. Once my shoes were on I bolted. I got to my car and drove home, leaving a trail of cigarette butts in my wake like Hansel and Gretel's breadcrumbs. I wouldn't follow them back.

Shikamaru hadn't said anything when I came home later than usual reeking of sex and tobacco, nor when I went straight to the bathroom and stayed there with the shower running for an hour. Standing there under the hot water, I was grateful for his understanding. I sunk down onto the shower floor with my knees against my chest and cried for the first time since 11th grade.


	3. Chapter 3

Naruto and I had gone to a high school a few hours from our art university. We were two of the only males in the art department, and we had an unspoken rival-oriented friendship that had begun in 7th grade. By 11th grade, we were close, though we would never own up to it.

"Stupid, wake up." I kicked the back of Naruto's chair and he sat up, stupidly looking around. His blonde hair moving around was a beacon of light for our teacher, Iruka, who immediately knew what had happened.

"Sasuke, thank you. Naruto, detention." It was a familiar ritual in biology class, waking Naruto up only for him to still get in trouble, but it would be broken after that day.

"Damn it," Naruto complained as we walked the path from his detention classroom to the art building, "Why is it only me who gets in trouble? If I sleep, I'm in trouble. If I wake up, I'm in trouble. What's with that?" He turned his blue eyes at me and I felt my heart quicken.

"Hn." I gave my usual answer that I give when the pressure in my chest starts to build. He accepted it as we kept walking. The fine arts center sat alone on a small hill with a long sloping path at its entrance, and we were the only ones in sight as most people had gone home or were at sports practice.

It had been four years since I realized I liked him (at this point I was too scared to say love), and I had been considering telling him at the homecoming party that night. I figured if he laughed it off or got angry I could tell him I was drunk. After all, I had never seen him with a girl, or guy for that matter. He treated everyone the same, but he spent the most time with me, so things looked hopeful.

Once we got to the ceramics classroom, Naruto excused himself to the bathroom while I tied up my hair, put on an apron and prepared to cut the clay. I scowled when I realized he hadn't told me which clay he wanted to use for his next project. Deciding to find him and ask, I left the room and headed towards the hall with the men's room. As I approached the hallways' intersection, I heard a girl's voice whispering. Instinctually I edged closer.

"…be fun!" I heard an exasperated sigh from the person with whom she was speaking before she went on, "I know you've done it with tons of girls, and you won't really even have to touch him, both of you can just focus on me, and he thinks it's a good idea… so there's no problem is there?" I widened my eyes but stayed silent, realizing with regret what kind of conversation I had unconsciously decided to eavesdrop on. I couldn't believe my fellow classmates were interested in this kind of stuff. Well, I was interested in such things theoretically, but I had yet to have my first kiss, let alone go shopping around for a third partner in a threesome.

"Look, I know it'll be your birthday, and I like both of you, you know, but I can't do that with a guy. They make great friends, but that's just… I wouldn't even sleep with Sasuke, you know? He's my best friend and sometimes kind of feminine and prissy, but I still wouldn't."

The salad I had at lunch decided then it had had enough of this conversation, and I felt it start to rise as the taste of bile entered my mouth. Ignoring the fact that Naruto and whoever that girl was would figure out what I'd heard, I ran past them straight to the bathroom. As soon as I was at the toilet, I started throwing up. I continued until I was dry heaving, shaking as I kneeled on the floor with my eyes closed. After a few minutes of calm, I opened my eyes to grab some toilet paper with which to wipe my mouth. I noticed the shadow over me.

"Hey, Sasuke, you okay?" I stayed quiet; he knew I had heard and expected some sort of explanation as to why he never confided in me, his supposed best friend, about the fact that he had been sleeping with "tons of girls." I knew he couldn't fathom that that part of the conversation was only the tip of the iceberg when it came to what bothered me. I looked up at him with the strongest glare I could muster, most of my energy drained from when the food left my stomach. He looked away, fidgeting.

"You're not sick are you? I told you that lettuce looked funny." I stared at him. "I would have told you, you know, but you just… don't seem interested in that sort of stuff. Whenever somebody talks about it, you just… zone out. Sorry you had to find out on your way to throw up." He attempted a smile, clueless that my nausea had awakened not from the physical condition of my stomach but from the emotional condition of my head. He offered me a hand, but I ignored it and stood up on my own after finally wiping my mouth.

Still wearing the art apron, I walked past him and out into the hall, not stopping for the half hour until I had breached my front door. I shut it behind me and sunk down, a preview of my night in the shower, crying for the first time since my parents died.


	4. Chapter 4

The day after I had sex with Sakura, she called to check on me. I really was a girl. I told her I was fine and would meet up with her on Monday after my freelancing class let out for lunch. Getting out of bed, I noticed it was well past noon. Forgoing breakfast, I scrolled the contact list on my phone before finding my favorite sushi restaurant and ordering my usual times two, just in case Shikamaru was still around. I knew I needed to talk to someone, and I knew he'd pay attention if I made the effort.

When the food arrived, I set it on the kitchen table before noticing there was a note: _Yes, I'll be back. Don't wear yourself out while waiting. –Shika._ I guess he predicted my rare talkative mood. I grabbed some sake from the kitchen before I lit a cigarette and sat at the table, ashing into one of the soy sauce containers. I never used it and Shikamaru never needed more than one.

I don't know how but at some point I fell asleep again. I woke up to Shikamaru pulling the barely lit cigarette from my fingers and taking a drag. _Good,_ I thought, _it hasn't been for long._ I sat up and spread my hand in indication for him to sit down and partake of the sushi and sake. We ate together in near silence—my talking necessitated the rare event of eating together. It was a warm-up of sorts.

Having finished my last piece of spicy tuna, I poured myself another cup of sake and began. "I slept with Sakura." No need to lead in. These conversations were always direct, no matter whether they were about my insecurities of leaving the closet or Shikamaru's relationship with one of the younger professors. It was more efficient this way.

"I figured. Why?" As if he didn't know. But I did need to say it.

"Because I'm sick of wanting something I can't have and I wanted to block it out."

"You felt disgusting afterwards."

"I don't hate Sakura."

"You're putting yourself through too much. Trying to turn straight is too much of a hassle for this problem."

"I'm not—"

"—you are. You should look for something positive, not just for something to take away the negative." He looked at me, setting down his chopsticks and reaching for my cigarettes. I watched him light one and close his eyes. "Have you considered finding a boyfriend?" My silence stretched on. "Or, even if it's not emotional, having sex with a guy who wants the same thing might give you at least a release that you won't feel sick about afterwards."

"It won't."

"Sorry?" He opened an eye. He didn't know I had slept with another guy before.

"I've tried it."

"Then I can only tell you what I've said before. Let him know you're gay. You don't have to tell him you love him, but at least being that honest with him will make your life easier. But you'll have to let Sakura know first."

The rest of Sunday went by as I finished off Final Fantasy XII and two packs of cigarettes, aided in part by Shikamaru, who was too lazy to buy his own. Around 8, as I had finished cooking and eating dinner (my roommate had went out for a date with Temari, his on-and-off girlfriend and architecture professor), I heard the buzzer ring from downstairs. I went to the video intercom near the door and saw a nervous Sakura waiting. I frowned but hit the button to let her in anyway. Shikamaru was right: it had become significantly more troublesome since I let a girl think she stood a chance and had reinforced her confusion by sleeping with her.

"Hey, Sasuke," Sakura said upon entering. "I… I got a feeling you weren't really okay after, you know, last night and the phone call and everything." Before I could dissuade her train of thought, she continued, "If I did something wrong, I—"

I brought her to my chest and hugged her for the first time. I didn't let go for a few minutes. When I broke off, I went towards the kitchen and finished clearing my plates and washing them. Sakura stood in the doorframe, watching.

"What's wrong? Sasuke, I love you, but… but you never hug me. So, what's wrong?" Her voice faltered, betraying the tears in her eyes. This, I realized, is why people say I'm cold; I can't bury my pride long enough to take responsibility and comfort someone. Instead, I had a tendency to wait until things got bad, and then blurt out my feelings without any sort of lead-in. She went on, crying without shame, "Just tell me and I'll try to fix it. It's like, I've waited years to be with you, but this isn't how I thought it'd be. I thought the first time would be… gentle, nice." She stood with her arms limp at her sides, shaking.

A few minutes went by, the only sound her quiet sobs. I faced her. "Sakura, I can't love you. I'm gay." Her mouth opened, then closed. She wiped her eyes.

"Oh, oh I see." She continued wiping her eyes, as the tears didn't stop welling up. "Then, then… you really can't love me. That's…"

"I'm sorry."

"No! No, you shouldn't be sorry… I'm sorry. I'll go. Thank you." With that she ran out. I dragged my feet as I watched her run down the stairs and to her car while desperately trying to call who I could only assume to be Ino, before driving away. Her small red car disappeared behind an oak tree on the corner and I went back inside.

The hard part was only beginning.

It was our last week of classes before Thanksgiving break. I knew neither Naruto nor I would be going home (since we both were lacking in the family department), which meant we were planning on doing what we did every holiday since I had moved out of the dorms second semester freshman year. As Naruto was bringing over the last of his necessary items (a bulk package of ramen), Shikamaru gave me a look reminding me of the importance of my task before heading out.

"I know. More troublesome." He nodded and went outside, leaving me alone for the week with Naruto, who would be sleeping in Shikamaru's room. As far as I knew, word about my sexuality had stopped at Sakura and Ino, and Naruto knew nothing.

"Ah, man, no girls for the rest of the week! At least I get to spend it with you! It's just like the old days."

"Hn." Ever since I found out about his sexual proclivity that day in the hallway, Naruto had unabashedly divulged all to me. After the first few times, while we were still in high school, I made it clear I didn't need to hear the details by punching him in the stomach. Since then, his news had become more general, but that didn't stop my throat from tightening each and every time.

I didn't want to make the week awkward, so I had it in my head to tell him the last day. I played the friend game more or less for the first few days to perfection. At night, I curled into a ball on my bed, the anxiety of my confession weighing heavier upon me with each passing night.

It was on one of these nights, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, that I found myself unable to fall asleep, no matter how many times I punched the pillow. Naruto and I had a few drinks that night watching an old season of _24_, him a lot more than I, and sometimes alcohol made my body uncooperative in more ways than just re-igniting a lifelong battle with insomnia.

No matter how strongly I willed it, my erection would not go down. After an hour of tossing and turning, I gave in, lifted the blanket off my lower half, squirted some lotion on my right hand and started by circling the slit on my cock's head with my index finger. My thighs tightened but I patiently endured it as the pleasure intensified and my left hand gripped the edge of the mattress. It only took a few minutes before my eyes started to roll back and I let a moan slip through my lips, knowing that Shikamaru's room was too far away for Naruto to hear me. Naruto… I pictured his rounded cheekbones and followed them with my mind's eye to the slope of his shoulders down the depression of his spine surrounded by toned muscle and across his firm ass that I hadn't seen in person since catching sly glances of it in the gym locker rooms back in high school.

"Naruto…" I moaned, having switched tactics to full strokes along my shaft, my left hand clenching the mattress tighter with what I knew to be white knuckles. My breath quickened to a near staccato as I approached climax. I closed my eyes and sped up, pumping my hand in time with my breathing, "Naruto…" I gasped his name as quietly as I could, eyes wide open, hips shuddering and white cream coating my hand, cock, boxers and abdomen. I closed my eyes again before sitting up quickly, wiping away the cum with a tissue, lighting a cigarette and heading to the bathroom to wash up. Maybe now I could get some sleep.

When I opened my door, Naruto fell backwards onto my legs from the sitting position he had taken up in the dark: back against my door, glass of water in his hand. I caught my breath and stared down past my bare chest, soiled boxers and naked legs at him, both our faces ashen. He was looking at the floor in silence.

A toilet rung from the apartment above us, and the refrigerator started to hum. I stared. His eyes stayed down. For how long we remained frozen like that, I don't know.

"Sasuke, I didn't mean—" his tentative voice brought me out of my stupor and I cut him off.

"Forget it." I moved away, letting him catch his balance on his hands, before continuing my journey to the bathroom. He grabbed my ankle and I fell, managing to flip myself over and land on my ass instead of my face. I took the cigarette out of my mouth and exhaled loudly. "Naruto. I said forget it." He looked up at me, the previous two times I had called his name still echoing in both our heads and filling the almost complete silence. The way his eyes focused and unfocused indicated that he was still drunk. Great.

He left the water on a nearby table and crawled closer to me, stopping between my legs to whisper, "Why didn't you tell me?" _Why didn't I tell him? That's it? That's all he has to say?_ I kept my thoughts hidden behind an expressionless face.

"Hn." I couldn't speak, despite the composure I feigned outwardly. Instead I just took a drag on my cigarette, which I had hitherto forgotten.

"Don't say that, Sasuke, I don't want you to be unhappy. I'm your friend remember?" Of course I remembered. That was the root of the problem. "I wouldn't care if you're gay, or whatever, but… you had Sakura."

"We broke up."

"Ah. So when…"

Before I could stop myself, I kissed him. Maybe it was because of the alcohol, but he didn't resist, even though I tasted like cigarettes, even though I knew I shouldn't and that it would, as Shikamaru's warnings pulsed in my brain, make things troublesome. I put my cigarette out on the wall, not caring, and let that hand join its partner in the soft bristles of Naruto's golden hair. I shut off my mind to all intelligent thought, and went with what was right in front of me.

As Naruto's experience with women might suggest, he was the dominant type. As my single incident with Sakura and my brief time with the only openly gay guy that had attended our high school, a redheaded, sad and violent mess named Gaara, could attest, I preferred to be in control as well. This was my one chance to pretend that Naruto felt the same way about me as I did about him, and I would be in control for this.

As I kissed him, teasing him like I had always dreamed, flicking my tongue against his, brushing his lips with as little contact as possible before forcing his head closer, I began to lift his shirt up over his head. Once off, I pushed him down onto the hardwood floor. He tried to fight back, pushing up on his arms, but he was no match for my weight, which I let rest on his chest as he sunk onto his back. I swiped a cushion from the couch next to us and put it under his head, which I cradled before slipping the cushion in. I looked him straight into his half-lidded eyes.

"Naruto." The desire and pain mixed in my voice. To put myself at ease, I went for his exposed neck, licking the long muscle that began near his jaw and disappeared under his collarbone. I bit it roughly while a rogue hand tugged at me to continue kissing him. I arched up, my legs straddling his hips, and slowly ran my fingers down his chest, lightly slapping his hand away with a smile as he tried to return the touch.

The situation itself was enough to return the hard-on I had so desperately banished earlier; I didn't need him to touch me. Because he was straight, though, I knew he'd need a little more pushing.

Therefore I was surprised when I scooted lower to tease his nipples that something hard already popped up against my abdomen. I laughed kind of darkly.

"Sasuke…" He sounded just as desperate as I was becoming. _It's different,_ I had to remind myself, _his desperation is physical only_. I ignored myself, instead busying myself with unbuttoning his pants with one hand and supporting myself with the other as I flicked his nipples with my tongue and grazed them with my teeth. The whole time, his hands were in my hair, pulling on my hair in bursts of pleasure.

I had finally managed to unbutton and unzip his pants when he pulled me up for a kiss that filled my mouth with his tongue while his hands trailed along the dip in my lower back, sending shivers across my body. I worried briefly that he'd try to get on top, so I reasserted myself by shimmying down to tear off his pants and boxers and my own boxers for good measure.

Our nakedness made me strangely blush, but Naruto was distracted from it as I grinded up against him and took one of his hands off my neck and put a lone finger in my mouth. I started sucking on it gently, occasionally taking my tongue to trace circles on the sensitive tip. I added another while I continued to press my hips rhythmically against his. I offered him my fingers and he cautiously started to suck on them. I moaned a little to keep him going. After they were wet enough, I reached behind myself and arched my back so that my chest was down and my ass was up. I slowly dipped one, then two, and finally three fingers into my ass as I bit down on Naruto's neck, panting.

He stiffened when he realized what I was doing, but I looked up, almost delirious, from the havoc I had wrecked on his tan skin and smiled before kissing him. "Naruto," I murmured into his lips. I felt myself loosening, the readiness from years ago returning to me, and I knew it was time. First, I moved down and took his whole length in my mouth, making sure I got it plenty sloppy. Then, I sat up, lifting my ass up—I didn't bother going to get the lube from my bedroom, quietly fretting that he would escape if I tried—and aligned it with his cock, which glistened under the faint light from the streetlamp shining through a gap in the curtains.

I felt the head penetrate my open hole and I shuddered as I let my weight sink me down around the shaft. Naruto, not a stranger to anal sex (even if it was until now with a girl), watched in a mix of fevered desire and awe as I smirked down at him, his cock enveloped in the warmth of my body. I closed my eyes and began to move, taking care to angle myself where he would hit my prostrate every time.

His hands traveled relentlessly, not knowing what to do with them without breasts to grab or hair to bury them in. I had remained upright, straining my leg muscles until they burned, igniting my desire further. Watching him falter as I maintained control, I leaned forward and rolled us over, my legs spread with him in between.

"Fuck me," I moaned as I grabbed his hand and wrapped it around my own throbbing cock. I guided his hand in sync with the pumping of his hips and felt my eyes start to roll back. It was nearly time. A sudden moan from the mouth above me, and a rush of wet heat inside me pushed me over the edge. I came gasping for air, squirting my cum once again on my abdomen, hand and cock, but this time also on Naruto's hand.

Naruto hovered over me, still inside, looking at me. I looked back, the flush from my cheeks and the glaze from my eyes fading. I felt his breathing return to normal. I saw the sweat begin to dry on his brow. I heard him open his mouth to break the silence.

"Shit, Sasuke. Uh…" With that, he pulled out and sat down on the floor, scratching his head. "That was… weird." My jaw clenched. "I mean, not bad weird, or funny weird, but just weird. I didn't think you… you know. Definitely different than doing it with a girl."

I knew that to him, sex was the same with everyone, but I had done it anyway. He loved everyone the same; I was embarrassed at my favoritism. I suppose the shame took over, because before I knew it, I had punched him in the same jaw I had kissed only minutes before, bending over him and repeating the process until he threw one of his own and popped me in the eye in self-defense.

I stood up and, finally, as I had tried before, went to the bathroom. When I got out of my shower, Naruto was still on the floor, face puffy and red with evidence of bruising under the swollen flesh. I ignored him and went to my room.


	5. Chapter 5

"He's been like that for a week," Shikamaru said from the living room, his voice barely making it to where I stood in the kitchen, putting jelly on my toast.

"What the fuck happened?" That was Temari's voice. "He's always moody, but this… it's like he's dead."

"Something happened with the guy he likes, you know, the blonde one I pointed out to you in the quad yesterday. I don't know if he confessed or what. He hasn't said a word to me since I got back. And Naruto, the blonde guy, apologized and ran out as soon as I got here."

"Hmm… kind of sounds like something that happened to my brother back in high school. He was crushing majorly on this guy who didn't seem into him. They got closer, but the idiot never confessed he actually had feelings under all that eyeliner. He dealt with it okay though. Ha. I should bring him over here and have him knock some sense into Uchiha."

"Less trouble for me if someone gets him to open up." Shikamaru yawned and lit cigarettes for himself and Temari while the succession of beeps I heard meant she was texting someone.

Toast and glass of water in hand, I went to the living room to swipe my cigarettes from the seat cushion next to Shikamaru and enter my bedroom. I knew I was being childish, not to mention destroying my perfect attendance for the semester, but I was so tired. All my energy had gone into those final punches to Naruto's face, and the food I ate and the sleep I endured did nothing to replenish me.

I ate my toast in bed, in the dark, brushing the crumbs that had strayed onto the sheet into a little pile when I was finished. I pinched them up until I had them all and put them on my plate. I drank my water and lit a cigarette, holding in the smoke until a fit of coughing seized me.

"Hey." Shikamaru knocked on my door. "This is such a drag," he said over his shoulder to someone in the living room. Returning to me, "Come out. I bought sushi." The toast from earlier was now just a faint scratchiness on the corners of my lips where crumbs had adhered, and my stomach let me know it had forgotten about it entirely with a low growl.

I vaguely remembered that Temari was still around, so I put a shirt back on before going out into the living room. When I opened the door, a billow of smoke exited the room with me and I squinted at the bright light.

"Aw, there he is. Finally remembering he's 22 and not 16, and coming out to talk like a big boy." Temari was a genius, I'll give her that. Her designs were amazing, but she lacked a little in the compassion department. Not that I didn't deserve it. I glared at her before noticing a tuft of red hair behind her shoulder, speaking to Shikamaru in the kitchen. My glare dissolved into surprise as I realized I knew that redhead quite well.

"Gaara."

"What?" Gaara turned around and looked at me, realization dawning on his face. "Temari," he said softly, "what was the name of the person you wanted me to knock some sense into?"

"That's him. Uchiha, er, Sasuke."

"I see." I could tell he'd hardly grown an inch since high school as he walked towards me. He stopped close enough for me to feel his breathe, his face turned upwards to search my face for the answer to whatever question he had, raised himself up on his toes to kiss me once deeply then pulled away, expressionless. "I think Sasuke will be just fine."

After we had finished our sushi and a few bottles of sake, Gaara followed me to my room. As we approached the entrance, I gave him a warning look over my shoulder indicating that he was not to try anything.

He smiled, a rare sight, and answered, "I gather you're still hung up on that idiot from high school. I knew it was a mistake for you two to go to the same art school." Letting him into my room was all the response I gave him.

We lay on the bed staring at the ceiling, talking about what was happening with people we used to know, how our hometown had changed. Little things. We didn't comment on how neither of us had quit smoking like we said we would, or how the shadow of a black eye still refused to give up its place on my face, until Gaara rolled over to his side.

"Sasuke, you know that last time I hit you?"

"What about it?"

"I loved you."

"I know. I wish you'd told me then, though. I might have been nicer to you if I'd known." He brought himself closer to me and wrapped an arm around my chest.

We slept like that until Temari nearly knocked the door down and then tried to hide her surprise that we had passed out so intimately by immediately backing out saying it was time for them to go unless Gaara either wanted to walk back to his sister's apartment, where he had been staying the week, or stay with me.

"I can't," Gaara whispered in my ear. "I have a boyfriend. He just moved here so I'm helping him move in. He's a lot like you, really. An artist, too. Short hair, though. Doesn't like bottoming as much." He added the last part with his usual straight face, and I laughed.

"Thanks, Gaara." He kissed me on the cheek, looked down at me from the edge of the bed and left.

I felt better the next day, going to class to convince my Web Design professor that I had caught a nasty cold the week before. The paleness of my skin, intensified by days of depression, toast and nicotine, earned me enough credibility to get away with it. I headed towards the Fine Arts building, where I knew Naruto would be in the basement's ceramic facilities, doing what he'd loved since high school.

Assuming he hadn't dropped another class or was skipping, I was expecting him to leave the building in around 10 minutes, since our classes ended at the same time, but ceramics was a bit harder to clean up than web design. I sat on the steps at the building's entrance and lit a cigarette, watching Sakura and Ino across the academic quad check out a bunch of guys skateboarding. She looked okay to me, which loosened a knot in my stomach I hadn't realized was there before.

I was shivering by the time I had started my second cigarette, and it was about time for Naruto to escape the confinements of class and prepare for Friday night partying. I tied my scarf properly around my neck and let a stream of smoke and condensation leave my mouth.

Suddenly I heard the door open behind me, and I turned around to find a herd of students, all of whom I recognized as ceramics majors, exiting the building and talking. Blonde bed-head spikes appeared above the crowd before being covered with an orange hat. I hurriedly put out my cigarette on the wall next to me. He didn't see me sitting on the edge of the steps, but, luckily, when I grabbed his hand, his sudden stop didn't trip anyone up.

"Jesus, Sasuke! You scared the shit out of me!" He stared at me. "Also, your hands are freezing. Were you waiting for me?" He gripped my hands with both of his gloved ones and blew on them.

I pulled them away and put them in my pockets. "I'm fine. More importantly, I need to talk to you."

"Yeah, sure thing, why don't we go over to Cubbyhole or something," he said, pointing in the direction of the local coffee shop.

"Come to my apartment." He looked away.

"I'd… um… I'd rather stay in the area. I've got stuff to do." He'd always been a shit liar.

"Sure."

"A chai? Seriously, Sasuke? I always had you pegged for an espresso man. Guess even your caffeinated drinks are girly."

"Hn." I held back my retort about his childish taste in hot chocolate because as much as I enjoyed our banter, I had a mission today. We sat down side by side on a large purple couch in the back, quietly sipping and listening to the guitarist in the front of the shop sing about, of all things, love. It got me a bit depressed, but back on track. "Naruto, I freaked out last week."

He eyed me over his cup, already aware that this had to have been what I wanted to talk about, but still surprised enough that I was actually sort of apologizing for it to show on his face.

"It's cool." He blew on his hot chocolate. "Um, some of the guys were planning an early birthday bash for me for tomorrow… do you… wanna come?"

When Gaara came over and entered my room, my look had denied him permission for intimacy, but I had ended up letting him put his arm around me, relaxing enough to fall into a deep sleep. Did I really want to see Kiba and that lot? No, not really. But I wanted to try at Naruto from a different angle.

"Sure."


	6. Chapter 6

"You really are gay, aren't you?" Temari had become a fixture of our living room. I stood in front of the full-length mirror on the bathroom door tilting my head and fluffing up the back of my hair.

"Hn." I walked around her to grab my coat and scarf off the back of the leather armchair. "Is Shikamaru ready?" I asked, tying my scarf around my neck. At that moment, he came casually into the living room, still tying up his long hair.

"Shikamaru. Why do you bother tying it up?"

"What?" The couple answered together.

"You don't want to waste energy to go get it cut, so you keep it long."

"Right."

"But isn't putting it up all the time a pain as well?"

"It's troublesome in my face." Having answered my question as best he thought reasonable, he threw on an old brown leather jacket and shoved matching gloves in the pocket.

The three of us headed outside into the cold. I patted my pockets to make sure I had everything, _Keys; wallet; cell phone; cigarettes; lighter. Good, I got all five._ With that, I locked the door behind us and we headed to my car.

Although it was Naruto's party, it was being held at Lee and Neji's apartment just on the other side of campus because, first of all, they simply had more space there than in a dorm room, and secondly, campus security didn't think very highly of parties of any sort.

We walked in late, thanks to Temari's inability to give me directions. Neji, also in architecture, blanched at the sight of Professor Sabaku, but once she grabbed the bottle of rum from which he had been pouring a shot and took a long swig of it before handing it to a shrugging Shikamaru, he calmed down.

All the usual suspects were there as well: Ino, Sakura, Kiba, Shino, Hinata, Chouji, Lee, Ten Ten and a few others I didn't recognize, including a tall pale boy who stood awkwardly and smirked at Naruto and Kiba's antics and a younger set of three who I recognized as some kids who had idolized Naruto back in our old town.

After handing Neji back the bottle, Shikamaru and Temari went to talk to the pale boy, whom apparently they knew, though I hadn't seen him before. Removing my jacket and scarf and leaving them on the coat rack, I went to the cooler in the kitchen to grab a beer, figuring that a Bloody Mary or anything more refined than that was out of the question. As I rummaged through the ice for something other than Budweiser I felt a cold wet thing hit my forehead.

I scowled, then, realizing whom it was, relaxed and took the bottle of Stella Artois from Naruto's calloused hands. "Thanks."

He grinned widely. "From my personal collection. Thought your girly taste buds wouldn't be able to handle anything else."

"Hn. Says the one who considers ramen fine dining."

"Ramen is fine dining." He lifted his own bottle and I clinked mine against it with a smile fighting its way out from behind my smirk.

Before we got any further in our conversation, we heard Sakura and Ino making a fuss in the living room and Naruto led us out to see what the problem was. I half-listened as I took my pack of cigarettes out of my pocket and lit one before carefully folding the foil back down and returning the pack to my pocket.

"What did you say?" Ino shrieked.

"I said I don't like her breasts." The tall awkward guy spoke.

"That's not something you say to someone when they ask if you want to share the seat with them! Sakura was just being nice!"

"But I don't feel comfortable near them."

As this continued without end, most everyone had gathered to gawk.

"Who is this guy?" I whispered to Naruto.

"Sai. He just transferred here. He's in Illustration, but he's taking a studio elective with me now so I figured I'd invite him so he'd feel more at home." Just like Naruto. We watched when suddenly Temari appeared behind us, putting her hands on our shoulders.

"What's going on?" she continued the hushed volume I had set. Naruto summarized briefly, and then Temari laughed. She laughed loudly, drawing everyone's attention to our corner.

"Sakura. Ino. I know I don't really know you girls very well, but trust me and just leave it," she said, wiping tears from her eyes. The younger girls looked at each other and turned back, unconvinced. Seeing that they needed a bit more evidence, she went on, "He's a stereotypical home schooled kid, and naturally awkward, to boot. Plus, he's gay."

"Just like Sasuke!" said Naruto, apparently attempting to clarify. At this point, however, everyone who didn't know I was gay turned and looked at me. But as I felt their eyes on me, waiting for some sort of either denial or affirmation, the wheels in my brain began moving and it clicked. Gay + artist + knows Temari must equal… Gaara's boyfriend. _He said this lanky, pale guy was like me?_ Sai's eyes lit up in understanding.

"You're the one he was heartbroken about." Ignoring the confused glances around us, he came forward. "Gaara told me about you."

"As he did to me, you." It was still silent other than the two of us. Finally I looked around and said seriously, "Yes, I'm gay. Now everyone please get wasted and forget about it." Most people went back to their drinks and I heard Lee proposition Neji for yet another competition, then ask if Sakura wanted to watch. Although a crowd gathered around them, Naruto stood with me, Sai and Temari, fidgeting. Temari, sensing tension in the air, grabbed Sai by the flipped black collar of his polo shirt and started asking him how he liked his classes so far.

I looked over at Naruto, who stared at his now empty beer with a crease in his brow and his lips scrunched together into a wrinkled pout. "By Gaara… did he mean that Gaara? The scary guy from home?"

"Hn."

"He… he was gay, wasn't he?" Despite his flushed cheeks that betrayed his blood alcohol content, he managed to put it together, although slowly. "He liked you? Never saw that coming… uh… did you ever…"

"Yes."

"Just once?"

"No." This conversation had not been a planned element in my new delicate approach to Naruto. Yet, I could see that since the situation had presented itself, and I had decided I had to explain this eventually, the only choice I had was to talk about it honestly. "Come here, Naruto."

I took my cigarettes out of my back pocket before sitting on Neji and Lee's worn-out couch and set them on the coffee table in front of me. From it, I grabbed the ashtray and set it on my leg. I felt the couch sink as Naruto sat next to me. I turned towards him, bending the leg closest to him in and resting my non-smoking arm on the back of the couch. I waited for him to look up from his new bottle before beginning.

"When we began high school, I realized I was gay."

"How?" Naruto asked.

I sighed. "I didn't watch the girls in gym. I found myself more occupied with the boys in the locker room. That's what I thought about at night, if you catch my drift."

"Yeah. Gotcha."

"You ready? No more interruptions. I don't really want to tell this story twice." He nodded, and I resumed. "Senior year, I missed a week of school when I caught the flu. I'm sure you remember; it was February, I think. Anyway, you weren't in my AP classes except for English, so I needed someone to bring me notes and homework. Our class dean realized Gaara was in all my other classes that you weren't in, so he brought me my work and explained things from class. After a few days, I was delirious and he kissed me when he thought I was asleep. I kissed back. I had never had a sexual experience at that point, and was frustrated, and he was just… Gaara, I suppose, so we let our bodies take control. He got the flu the next week from me and I returned the favor once he got better enough. It stopped when we graduated. Now, apparently, he's with Sai." My throat was dry from saying so much at once and I quickly finished my beer and went to go get another.

As I walked away from Naruto, I heard the excited cries of my friends and the giggles of girls, and Lee, from across the room, and smiled to myself. I grabbed Naruto a beer as well, as I was drunk enough for a cold Budweiser to be not as awful as usual. I noticed my cigarette had gone out in my hand, and I had probably ashed all over the floor as I had gotten up. I wet the end to ensure that it was out, and threw it away before taking the two beers and returning to Naruto.

When I returned, I saw Naruto was still buried in thought. "Hey, idiot, your face is going to get stuck like that." I tapped the bottle against his forehead like he had done to me when I first arrived, and he smiled. "Naruto, before you say anything, please don't tell anyone this story. Only you, Shikamaru and Temari know. And Sai, I suppose." I handed him the bottle opener on my keychain and leaned forward to grab another cigarette.

I lit up and opened my beer, the cigarette balanced between my lips. Naruto took it from them and put it to his own. I looked up as he took in a shallow puff of smoke. He followed the smoke's path he exhaled before looking at me, whispering, "indirect kiss," and sticking the cigarette back in my mouth.

"How many drinks have you had, Naruto?"

"Six… plus four… plus three with you."

"That's too many." I smirked and went for the beer I had handed to him. Frenzied, he got up and tried to drink it all before I reached him. With a satisfied belch, he put the empty beer on the table just as I tackled him to the floor, leaving my indirectly kissed cigarette on the ashtray and my beer on the table. I tickled him until tears started to form in his eyes, until I could feel his abs shake from over-exertion, and until Lee, Ten Ten and Kiba had jumped into the pile, all of us a mess on the floor.

The following morning, as people where started to get up and leave, Shikamaru pulled me aside before rousing Temari from her slumber on the couch.

"I saw you last night."

"Hn."

"New strategy?"

"I fucked up before. I don't think he really knows me very well, as a friend. Or as someone capable of love. I want him to see that, I suppose." Shikamaru patted me on the back before trying to awaken the sleeping dragon. Not wanting to fall victim to her grouchiness, I took the opportunity to go to the bathroom and wash my face. Rounding the corner, I bumped into Naruto, knocking him to his feet.

"Idiot." I offered my hand, and he took it, the grin formed by his lips belying something hidden behind his eyes. I smiled to ease him, and whatever it was disappeared.


	7. Chapter 7

The next few weeks went by quickly as we prepared for our end-of-semester critiques. I didn't see much of Naruto, who was stuck in the cold ceramics basement while I was in the Communication Arts building, trying not to overload the school computers by opening more than two programs at once. _Graphic design had definitely been the better choice,_ I thought to myself as I looked out the window towards the Fine Arts building, whose basement windows were half-covered with snow.

I had just finished my last project that was due next Monday, so I decided to go find Naruto. He appeared to have forgiven the incident over Thanksgiving, and we were in the midst of plans for winter break when, once again, he would take over Shikamaru's room. My hands shoved deep in my pockets, I shuffled through the snow towards the old stone building further down the quad.

Once inside again, I shook the snow from my hair and wool coat and took the stairs down into the basement. I heard Naruto's voice from one of the classrooms, though I couldn't distinguish what he was saying. When I got there, I saw him seated behind one of the wheels, a lump of unworked clay upon it, looking up at Sai who sat on one of the worktables. Naruto's mouth shut mid-sentence.

Sai gave me a deceivingly vacant glance. "I must leave, Naruto, but you can ask Sasuke. He is just as knowledgeable." Sai slipped off the table and brushed his shoulder against mine on the way out.

"Ask Sasuke what?" I questioned Naruto, looking down at his blonde head.

"It's no biggie; I'll just finish the conversation with Sai later." He frowned at the pile of clay in front of him before flashing me a grin; "I don't really know what to do with this now." I put on the apron Sai had left on the table and squatted down next to Naruto, pushing his foot down on the pedal with my fingers to get it to start spinning. I stuck my index finger in the center of the lump and started to shape it as Naruto controlled the speed and handed me tools silently. After about 45 minutes, we stopped.

"It's lumpy," I said, "but will you fire it for me?"

I ran into Sai the following day and, feeling like there was something to his conversation with Naruto from the previous day, asked him about it.

"He didn't continue it with you?" the tall boy asked from behind a carton of milk.

"No."

"I've learned it is not uncommon to feel uncomfortable when asking someone you know personal questions that have been avoided."

"I did ask."

He raised an eyebrow. "That is not what I meant." The only plausible interpretation of Sai's remark suggested that Naruto had been talking about me when I had interrupted them. "And now, I am done with my critiques and finals, and go to see Gaara." With that, he stood up, smirked, and left. Awkward and abrupt though he was, Sai was smart: he knew how to say just enough to point me in the right direction without betraying Naruto's trust. The only question I needed an answer to was this: _What had Naruto been asking about me?_

Sitting in the cafeteria dining hall booth Sai had left me in, I closed my eyes in thought. I didn't think Sai would have known any more details about my relationship with Gaara than I had already told Naruto, so even had he asked, there would have been nothing more to tell and therefore no need for Naruto to continue speaking with him. I also knew that Gaara had not revealed my long-endured love of Naruto to anyone, not even his boyfriend. In addition, Naruto hardly needed relationship advice from someone as graceless as Sai, so it wasn't that either.

"Hey, Sasuke," a familiar feminine voice forced me to open my eyes. She had her pink hair tied back and she offered a white paper bag in my direction. "I never gave this back, even thought it's been about a month. Sorry." I looked in to see my blue dress shirt that I had worn that night in her room.

"Can I sit?" I nodded. "Something's bothering you."

I smiled. "How'd you know?"

"You're sitting in the cafeteria, where I haven't seen you since fall of freshman year, with no food, a slight scowl and your eyes closed. You're not asleep, so you must be bothered by something." I hesitated, and she reassured me, "Don't worry. I'm fine. Even though I'm mostly over loving you, I can't help liking you as a person, and caring about you."

"How did you do it?"

"Do what?"

"Deal with loving someone who isn't interested that way in people of your gender," I mumbled, eyes cast down.

"Oh. Well, as you can recall, I'm sure, my tactic wasn't particularly… nice. For either of us. You had me fooled, you know. For a while, after you confessed to me, I thought about the night before, wondering how you got that far while lying to yourself. Wondering if it was just a trick to push me away. It was only because it came from you directly that I believed you weren't interested. I'm a pretty simple person, I guess. I could never do that with somebody I didn't feel attracted to in at least some way."

I remembered my night with Naruto, but even though I considered him to be far simpler than Sakura, there was no evidence that he felt attracted to me physically. If it had been up to him, nothing would have happened. It was only because I touched him in a way that anyone with any libido whatsoever couldn't ignore that we had gone as far as we did. Lost in the memory, I sighed.

"Remembering something?"

After all I had done to Sakura, if she was really willing to care this much, I felt I owed it to her to let her in. "I slept with him, but he was drunk, and treated it like it was no big deal. I punched him, and he punched me back, but we're pretty much back to how we were before now. And, yeah, it's probably who you think it is, but please don't tell anyone. Least of all him."

"Did you guys talk about it afterwards? The sex?"

I thought about it, but the only time we mentioned that whole incident was at Cubbyhole, and we had only tiptoed around it by referencing the punches thrown after the sex. "No."

"Maybe you should start there."

"You and I never did." I saw her point, but a part of me still didn't understand how she did it.

"We just did. I'm glad I talked with you, today, Sasuke, but I have a date to get ready for, so I'll see you later, 'kay?"

"Yeah."


	8. Chapter 8

Shikamaru had left, and Naruto had made himself comfortable on the floor in front of our flatscreen, trying out each of my videogames for a short while before putting it back and taking out another. I left my bedroom in the morning to find Naruto doing just that, exactly as I had seen him the previous night on my way to bed.

"Have you been here all night, idiot?" I ruffled his hair and he jumped.

"Don't mess up my hair, you bastard, I've worked on this look all night." He paused the game and looked up at me. "Couldn't sleep."

"Did you eat?"

"Uh… I had some ramen a few hours ago, I guess."

"That's not real food." Before he had a chance to differ, I went to the kitchen and started taking things out of the fridge. I heard his bare footsteps follow me a few seconds later.

"Can I help?"

"Why don't you sleep? I'll wake you up when it's ready," I answered, still looking for the broccoli I had chopped and stored yesterday.

"If you're sure…" He lingered for a few moments before I heard his footsteps grow fainter as he walked away.

I cooked without a recipe, like I always did, just relying on my usual mix of garlic, ginger, salt and cayenne pepper to spice the tilapia, and adding only a pinch of salt to the vegetables. It took no more than 30 minutes, so after scooping some rice from the rice cooker onto each plate, I dropped the plates off at the table before searching for Naruto.

When I saw that he wasn't passed out on the couch like I thought, I went to Shikamaru's room. I knocked on the door, but heard no answer. Cracking it open, I saw the bed was empty. _Did he actually go to sleep on my bed?_ I scowled to myself as I backtracked towards my room. Not bothering to knock, I opened the door. He was on my bed, but not sleeping. I raised my eyebrows as I noticed he was reading.

"I thought you only did that by force," I said as I sat on the edge of the bed next to him. His eyes stayed glued to the page, but I could tell he heard me. "Food's going to get cold, so come on out. I'll lend whatever it is to you if you want."

He got up, shutting the book and putting it under his arm. "I'll go drop it off on my bed. See you in the kitchen!" He hurried out, and I glanced at my bookshelf. The only disturbed shelf had all my academic books. Deciding I'd wait to discover which book it was if he didn't tell me—which, given his actions, I figured was the case—I followed my own advice and went to eat before the food got cold.

After eating, I washed the dishes and Naruto finally passed out on the couch. When I was done, I took the opportunity to see what book he had been so desperate to hide from me. Looking over my shoulder to make sure he wasn't suddenly going to wake up, I cracked open the door to Shikamaru's room and stepped in, closing the door behind me. The book was on the bed, facedown and half-covered by an orange blanket. I picked it up. _Sexuality and the Modern Man._

"Ah," was all that came out of my mouth. My mind, on the other hand, had a different monosyllabic response: _Why?_ I returned the book to how I found it and exited, pondering.

Back in the living room, I sat in the armchair smoking and staring at Naruto. His lips parted slightly though he breathed through his nose. I watched his chest rise and fall, his hand innocently expose his stomach when he went to scratch it, his hips shift as he rolled slightly forward. I returned my gaze to his lips, which had begun to move, mouthing incoherent words breathily. My chest tightened; I let my fingers linger on my own lips as I brought my cigarette to my mouth.

We had been going around in circles, I knew. Our friendship had returned, but he had been trying, albeit obviously, to hide things from me. Things I had learned from Sai, and guessed from this sudden interest in sexuality, that had to do with me. I chewed on the filter of my cigarette while deciding whether to wake him up.

So fast that I startled myself, I stood up and tossed the cigarette butt in the ashtray. I walked to the couch and kneeled down by his face, placing my hand on his cheek. It was softer than I thought it would be for a guy our age, and I ran my fingers across it, bringing them to the lips that had fascinated me moments earlier. Naruto mumbled and began to adjust his position.

Returning my hand to his cheek to keep him facing me, I whispered, "Naruto." He licked his lips and opened an eye to let me know he heard. "Can we talk?"

"Sure," he yawned, and sat up to stretch his arms high above his head. I sat in the space his upper body had vacated, the warmth cradling my thighs.

I didn't really know how to start. The conversation with Sakura replayed in my head, and it spilled out before I could find a way to rephrase, "Let's talk about sex."

Naruto laughed at my inarticulate conversation starter. "Yeah, sure, what about it?"

"Not… not, just sex. Like sexuality. And, I suppose we should talk about from Thanksgiving break."

"Oh. Alright, I guess, what about it?" In dropping his gaze, his attempted casualness revealed the insecurities this subject carried for him.

"How do you feel about it?"

"What do you mean how do I feel about it? How do you feel about it?"

"I… I won't lie to you, Naruto. I enjoyed it. I told you about me and Gaara, and other than the two of you there haven't been any others. Unless you count Sakura. I'm not the type to sleep around. I have a few regrets about it, I suppose. I hit you afterwards. You were drunk. Mainly I'm just mad at myself that I didn't care about your feelings towards the whole thing. I want to fix that now, if I can."

"And about sexuality?" He finally returned my gaze.

"The book."

"Oh. You saw?" Again he looked away, focusing on getting some dirt out from underneath his nails. I watched in silence until his nails were clean. He looked up briefly and smiled sheepishly.

"I saw," I answered belatedly.

"Then…" Naruto paused to swivel his legs under his body into a kneeling position on the couch, turning to face me in the process. He leaned forward and pressed a hand to my cheek. I had never seen him look so serious before. The hand kept contact as it traced the route from the square of my jaw, to the gully above my collarbone, to the clothed expanse of my chest—only stopping when it reached the boundary of my pants. The entire time I tried to control my breathing and maintain eye contact, but the pounding of my heart only intensified.

"I never thought it'd be gross. I didn't think I'd like it, either. Not like women; I'd always thought I'd like that. Maybe it's like the book says and it's just what I expected to like, and I was lucky enough to like it. You… you probably expected to like them, too, at one point, right? But I think I like this, too. I guess I never really thought about it."

"You were asking Sai about it." My heart fluttered, but I overcame it, reminding myself not to take advantage of the situation by forcing my feelings on him. I needed him to lead us to wherever we were going, for selfish and compassionate reasons alike.

"Huh? Oh, yeah. I was." He bit his lip. "It's funny, though, I don't want to touch Sai, or any other guy. Just… just you." He said the last part in his smallest voice, as if he didn't want me to know. "Sasuke, the time I heard you in the bedroom, you know, doing that, I was on the way to get some water, I swear."

"I'm hardly worried about that, now."

"You don't care?"

"I did then. A lot. Now… I suppose I care about other things more."

"I didn't really realize this then, I guess I was too surprised that you were thinking about guys and the fact that it was me kind of didn't hit me, or something, but did you say my name because you liked me?"

"Yes." I broke the gaze, but I had to get through this conversation, even though by this point the pain in my chest was so intense I wanted to leave and forget I ever said anything.

"Do you still?"

"…Yes." My mouth dried up and throat constricted.

"Girls have told me they've loved me before, you know, but I never could say it back. I had fun with them, sure, but that's not want love is, I don't think. I'm not sure what it is, actually. I want to believe it's something nicer."

"It's okay, Naruto. You don't have to love me." I attempted a smile.

"But I think I want to, Sasuke. You're my best friend and I want you to be happy. I wish I could make myself love you. I like you. I want you. Why can't I love you?" He fell forward, leaning his head on my chest while a hand gripped my shoulder. Silent tears pooled in my eyes, and I wiped them away before he could see.


	9. Chapter 9

The day after our conversation, I made blueberry pancakes. I made them into different shapes on a whim: a heart, a star, a dinosaur (stegosaurus, to be exact), lips, an N, and finally a few standard circles so the rest wouldn't get cold while I worried about artistry. Naruto came out of Shikamaru's bedroom just as I was putting butter on a plate and maple syrup in a ceramic creamer that I had made in high school.

"Ooh, pancakes! You were smoking while cooking! That kind of takes away some of the charm." The night's sleep had erased his worries, and he was his usual, beaming self.

"I'm tired. It helps." I, conversely, had spent almost the whole night ruminating upon every detail in, retracing every twist of and finding better solutions to all aspects of last night's conversation. Despite all that, I had yet to think of the proper protocol for behavior this morning, which is why I was deliriously making cutesy pancakes and chain-smoking my way through my exhaustion.

I offered Naruto a plate with a heart, a dinosaur, lips and an N, before settling down across from him with one of my own. Still holding a cigarette, I stacked my circular pancakes and put the star on top to decide how I would cut it. Naruto began eating, but observed me from across the table. I finally decided to cut off all the points on the star, first, and then divide the center along with the circular pancakes into wedge-shaped pieces.

"Sasuke. Oi. Sasuke." I realized Naruto had been trying to get my attention.

"What?"

"Don't be so anal. They're just pancakes."

I scowled. He smiled and reached across the table, stabbing one of my star points with his fork, and waving it in front of my mouth. I looked away, yet acquiesced.

"Needs maple syrup," I announced after reflecting upon the taste. He pushed it towards me and I drew thin, even stripes atop my pancakes with it. This, I decided, was how I wanted life to be.

The sound of cars zooming emanated from the TV, but I could hear Naruto muttering from his seat on the floor below me. As I passed the checkered stripe on the road, he groaned, "Not again!" He dropped the controller on the floor and tilted his head up to look at me upside down. "Why is it always like this, Sasuke? Why?"

Naruto sat on the floor with his back between my legs, leaning against the armchair I sat in. I smirked, "Just the way it is, idiot. I will always be better than you."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. I'm going to sleep. Just you wait, after I'm refreshed, I'm gonna come out here and kick your ass!"

"Hn." I watched him pick himself up and scuffle to his bedroom, my heart picking up pace as he began to take off his shirt on the way. I turned off the game system and TV and closed my eyes to calm down.

A midnight text from Shikamaru woke me up from my nap in the armchair, and after reading it, I stood up to wash my face and brush my teeth so I could go to bed properly. While drying my face with a towel, I heard a strange noise from Naruto's room. Worried that something might be wrong, but still recognizing the possibility that he could be talking in his sleep, I tiptoed towards the door.

"Mnn… Sasuke…" I froze. So this was how Naruto had felt at my door that night. Only, in addition to the shock and mild discomfort at hearing someone call out my name in his masturbatory fantasies, I was definitely turned on. I leaned my head against the door, enjoying the heavy breathing I managed to hear, and the occasional moans. Part of my mind registered the voyeuristic perverseness of my actions, but I couldn't leave. More importantly, I couldn't let him finish.

I knocked on the door, hearing him move the blankets around for a moment before answering, "Uh, Sasuke? What's up?"

"Let me come in."

"Now?"

"Yes, now."

Without waiting for a response, I opened the door, the light from the hall causing Naruto to block his eyes with his arm and squint. I shut it behind me and walked towards the bed.

"Sasuke?" I crawled onto the bed. "Hey, what are you doing?" I straddled his half-naked body though he pulled away, trying to hide his erection.

"What were you doing?" I whispered in his ear.

"Nothing."

"Liar. I heard you." He shivered at my warm breathe in his ear.

"I… was trying it out. Thinking about you. Instead of a girl." He tried to fight my weight as I pushed him to lie down.

"How's it going so far?" I nibbled at his neck.

"Bastard. …" he moaned.

"Naruto, I love you."

"Sasuke…"

Putting a finger to his lips, I answered, "I love you. I want you. You might not love me, but you want me, too. That's a step in the right direction."

He sunk back willingly onto the mattress, and I followed. _I'm such an idiot,_ I thought as I pressed our lips together, enjoying the way his chapped ones scratched mine as they opened. His tongue hesitated at the entrance of my mouth; my own brushed it, coaxing it. Naruto became more confident, putting a hand in my hair and biting gently on my lower lip.

I pulled back and smirked, "What were you fantasizing about before I interrupted you?"

His hand still in my hair, he looked away. "I'm not going to tell you that."

"I thought best friends told each other everything."

"Wha—but this is different!" he hissed, bringing his hand back and covering his mouth with it, as if the answer to my question would escape.

"I need to know what you're comfortable with. I don't want to force myself on you like last time."

"Then what are you doing on top of me?"

He was right, of course, but once I was in seduction mode, I couldn't pull out of it. "Do you want me to get off?"

He growled, which I took to mean the negative. He pulled a pillow over and covered his mouth with it, mumbling something into it.

"What?" I waited in silence, skating my fingers across his bare chest, flicking his nipples whenever I came across them.

"Ugh! Fine… You were… down there." He quickly glanced towards his groin before hiding behind the pillow again.

"Here?" I asked, sliding my hand down and curling the tips of my fingers under his balls while my palm rested on the base of his cock. I drew the hand upwards, the relaxed fingers naturally curving around the shaft. The delicacy tortured him; I heard a moan from under the pillow and he jiggled his leg.

My hand caressed the head as I bent down to leave a trail of kisses, interjected with the occasional bite, from his neck to his left nipple. I continued lower to swirl my tongue on the taut skin around his bellybutton, following a tangential path to the line defining his groin from his thigh, my face brushing where blonde curls began to cover the tender skin. Stroking the head of his cock as I finally removed my hand, I replanted it in the curls below, running my fingers through the tangles and looping my thumb underneath the hot base of his cock that my tongue had slowly begun to tease.

Only my love of being teased eclipsed my love of teasing, and I let Naruto feel it. I gave him the treatment I enjoyed giving myself when getting myself off, but instead of my hand, I indulged him with my tongue and lips. First, my tongue moved in small circles at the slit of his cock, spiraling outwards and drawing my mouth around just the head for brief sucks. I broke contact after every pull on the head, and Naruto stiffened below me. Finally I relented, at least a little, taking my tongue from where my thumb still rested all the way back up.

"Damn it, Sasuke…" He threw the pillow off his head and moaned. "Please…" Back at the top of his cock, I took him in as far as I could while zigzagging my tongue along its underside. Desperate, Naruto brought his hand to my head, guiding my bobbing head into a rhythm he matched with thrusts of his hips. I let him win, sensing that he was close to either passing out or climax depending on which route I took.

Naruto sped up his thrusting, and whimpered, "Sasuke…" His grip on my hair tightened. The hips below me started to jerk more violently as a stream of hot, thick cum shot into my mouth. I swallowed it all so I could stay down there a bit longer, licking up the drops that escaped from his twitching, emptied cock. With every twitch, his breath caught and his body tensed.

I crawled up next to him, licking my lips. "Is that what you were thinking of?"

He laughed, exhausted, "Something like that, I guess." He rolled over to look at me. "Are you… okay down there?"

"You offering?"

"Should I?"

"I'll put it on your tab."


	10. Chapter 10

When I woke up, it was colder than I remembered and I could hear the shower running from the other side of the apartment. Naruto's scent lingered on the sheets and I buried my face in his pillow. Had I done the right thing last night? The Uchiha self-control I had prided myself on rubbed off so easily when he was near. Deciding to worry about it some day other than Christmas, I got up to wait for my turn in the shower.

I could still hear the water running from the bathroom while I picked out some clean clothes to wear: favorite dark jeans, black boxers, black v-neck and black belt. Nothing says 'Happy Holidays' better than monochrome. The pile tucked under my arm to light a cigarette, I left my bedroom in nothing but my boxers. _He's still in there?_ I asked myself before plopping onto the armchair. The leather was cold against my back.

It took me two cigarettes to wonder whether something was wrong. I had a tendency to stay in the shower for a long time, preening, as Temari liked to call it, but to Naruto a long shower meant five minutes. If he had just gotten in when I woke up, it had already been 20.

"Naruto?" I tapped on the bathroom door. He was in there; I could hear the sound of the water change when he moved. "Are you alive?" I waited, but still heard nothing. At last I gave up and opened the door.

"Don't come in!" he cried, pulling the curtain closer to the wall.

"Why not?" I stood in the doorway with my hand on the doorknob.

"Just don't. I'll be out in a minute, just… leave, okay?"

I ignored him and sat down on the lid of the toilet. "What's wrong?" I bit my lip, speaking my fear, "Is this about last night?" I looked over, noticing that his huddled form sat on the floor of the tub, in my favorite position when I was upset.

"Have you really only slept with me and him?" This was not the question I expected, but I reaffirmed the fact anyway, waiting for him to go on. "There's nobody else?"

I had two questions of my own I wanted to answer in response, so I stopped, wondering which one to go with. Was he jealous? Why did he think that anyway? I went what I thought was the nicer way, inquiring, "What makes you ask?"

"I need to know."

"What? Naruto…" I buried my face in my hands before breathing in deeply through my nose and pushing my hair out of my face. "Are you really stupid? I… I've loved you since high school. Only you. I thought I made that clear."

"I really like you, Sasuke. I woke up this morning feeling better than ever, but I remembered something from the night of my birthday…"

"Naruto. That was weeks ago."

"I know! I was drunk then, so something must have triggered the memory… I heard you talking to someone about how there's somebody you want to become better friends with, to show them you could love. You were talking about me, right?"

"Of course I was talking about you. I was never honest with you. That's not what friends do. I'm honest with you now. That's what I was talking about with Shikamaru."

"Oh. I just wanted to make sure."

"You know, Naruto, despite that stupid grin you wear all the time, you become neurotic at some pretty minor stuff." Before he had a chance to respond, I pulled back the shower curtain and stepped inside with my boxers still on. I sat next to him.

He leaned his head on my shoulder and, after a few minutes, sighed, "Why am I so worried about you anyway? You're just an arrogant, sadistic closet-pervert."

"And you're an easy, naïve, stupid playboy. But I love you."

"Bastard…"

"Idiot."

"Merry Christmas."

Later that day, Naruto and I sat on the large couch watching _Love Actually_. (Temari had left it for me to use on a "date night".) He leaned against me, my arm wrapped around him, eyes watering as Mark's wedding video of Juliet made her realize that he had loved her. Though I, too, felt myself empathizing with Mark, Naruto took it much more seriously.

"Can't she see he loves him? If he had only told her before she was married…" he whispered to himself. Suddenly, he grabbed the remote off the table and paused it. My arm that he had dislodged from his shoulder had fallen to my side, and he grabbed it. "Sasuke!"

"Yes?"

"You know, this morning I was pretty stupid."

"I was aware."

"Whatever, bastard, I'm trying to be serious." He took a deep breath, and began again, more slowly, "I'm like Mark, but before Juliet got married. I want to stop you before you find someone else. And this morning, I just… had to make sure. I've always been too scared to commit. Wanting to make everybody happy, but not caring about myself as much. I guess that's obvious, right? God, what am I even saying? I can't believe I'm getting embarrassed. Uh… I guess what I'm trying to say is: Don't leave me, Sasuke." He buried his face in my chest and brought one hand up to it, pulling at my shirt. Barely loud enough for me to hear, he said, "Because I think I love you."

"Naruto…" I let out the air I had unconsciously been holding in, and released my tense muscles to bring his body closer. "I've always been too scared to be happy, because that meant being honest. I'm not very nice; I'm arrogant and moody… but if you'll have me, I won't leave you."

He raised his head and smiled. It wasn't one of those huge Naruto grins, but rather a real smile, one that naturally sparkled in his blue eyes. He let go of my shirt and brought the hand to my face. "You're really pretty, you know?"

Before I had a chance to express my indignation or mask my pleasure, he leaned forward into a kiss and slid his hand down my back to pull me closer. He folded his legs under himself and pushed himself on top me so that my back rested on the pillow and I had propped against he armrest. My own legs had come up onto the couch framing him on either side of his body. As he pressed into me, his lips nipped at my neck, sending shivers down my body.

The lack of control was driving me crazy, and Naruto sensed it. "Tough it out. It's time you get a taste of your own medicine." My toes curled when he breathed into my ear. "Hmm… you like that, don't you?"

"Do it again," I demanded, my voice less commanding and more breathy than I would have liked. I really did like to be in control of my own pain and desire.

"Like this?" he slowly blew into my ear and I could hear his wetness of his tongue licking the edge and his mouth sucking on the lobe.

I tilted my head so my mouth was near his ear, and answered, "Just like that," before returning the favor by dragging my teeth down his earlobe. His back arched slightly, driving his hips into mine. I would have my control. I grabbed his ass and moved him into a slow tempo of grinding while my mouth took the opportunity to latch onto his neck and leave a nice red hickey.

"Bastard…" Naruto groaned. I slid my hands under his shirt and began bringing it over his head. Once off, my hands roamed over his bare skin, occasionally scraping my nails into his back. He hadn't relinquished control quite yet, however. He pushed my shirt up and teased my nipples with a finesse the likes of which I'd never known. The combinations of flicks, bites and sucking made me moan and sink down deeper onto the couch. I felt the ache in my groin grow hotter as we continued to push against one another and battle for power.

I rubbed a finger along the skin just on the inside of his pants, but before I had a chance to work the button and zipper, Naruto had escaped downward to pull off my jeans—when he had unzipped them I hadn't a clue. He took my boxers off too, leaving me lying on my back with just a black shirt pushed up above my chest. I saw him grab something out of his pocket and spread its contents on his fingers.

I closed my eyes in preparation, but before I felt my ass being penetrated, a wet heat spread over my cock, which could only mean he was sucking me off. He took it all in at once, and after about a minute, I felt the first finger go in. I curled up to make myself more accessible, but not before another finger went in.

"Naruto… don't… let me… cum… yet," I panted with one eye watching him.

He rose up, circling the tip of my cock before speaking, "Under all that sadism, you're such a masochist, aren't you?" He pushed the third finger in, hard.

A low moan escaped and I saw him smiling at me. "You just… noticed now?"

"Fine, then. What do you want me to do to you?" This was how I liked it. Dictating my own torture.

"In… in my bedroom," I gasped in between the thrusts of his fingers and flips of his tongue against my tip, "in the second drawer… next to my bed… get… get the black vibrator." His eyes widened, but he hurried to my room. In his absence, I delicately twirled my finger against the head of my cock, not wanting to waste a moment. When he came back, fat vibrator in hand, I told him to cover it in lube and put it in.

"Alright, here it comes." He watched, fascinated, as the head of the toy slipped in and then the rest of it disappeared inside me, leaving only the battery-holding end outside. My eyes rolled back in pleasure.

"Don't… don't touch my cock yet. Tease me any other way." My ignored cock burned with desire to release, and I relished it as the agony intensified with every mark Naruto left on my neck, with every tightening and release of his hands along my inner thighs, with every kiss he laid on my lips.

My hand found his cock hanging above me, hot and slightly wet with pre-cum and the sweat it had picked up from rubbing against our bodies. "Come up here; sit on my chest… and lean forward on the armrest," I demanded. He followed willingly, leaning forward to give me full oral access. I gave it the pleasure my own longed for, grabbing the base with my hand and pulling my lips against the shaft, all the while ignoring the tremors in my hips as the vibrator stimulated my prostate and tormented my cock. Once Naruto's breathing was labored, I stopped and, blowing onto him as I spoke, told him it was time.

He crawled back down my chest, and stopped when his hips ran parallel behind mine. "Should I, just pull it out?"

"Slowly," I hissed, grabbing whatever my hands were touching tightly as the vibrator slid out. With his other hand, Naruto had lubed himself. He looked into my eyes, his breathing still hard, and he swallowed. I leaned forward and grabbed his cock, aligning it with my still open hole, and pushed myself down the couch onto him.

"Shit…" Naruto moaned, giving his body complete control as it rammed into me. After the first few pushes, I began to pump my cock in time. My body felt hot all over and my hips twitched violently as I began to cum. A short squirt flew from my cock onto my chest, but I returned to total hardness as Naruto battered my prostrate and my hand continued stroking.

I became totally delirious at this point, moans and curses flowing from my mouth nonstop. With every thrust of my hips, I felt myself getting closer to another orgasm, but I tried to hold out for when Naruto spilled into me. His hands on my hips turned white he gripped so hard, and then, finally, I let it go.

"Fuck!" I gasped, shooting cum across my body. Affected by the tightening of my ass, Naruto followed a moment later, filling me up and sending waves of pleasure through my exhausted body. We stayed like that, catching our breath and staring into one another's eyes.

I shuddered as he pulled out, realizing too late that my ass was going to be very sore for the next few days. I closed my eyes at the thought, feeling his cum spill out of me onto the couch. He squeezed beside me and rested his head on his arm. Feeling his eyes on me, I stole a one-eyed glance at him.

"What?"

"I've never seen you look so… satisfied."

"Hn." I smiled. "You have no idea."

"After that, I'm thinking I really do love you."

I grabbed the pillow my head had been resting on and hit him in the face with it.

"You bastard! What was that for?"

"I love you, too, idiot." I pulled him down so that his head rested on my shoulder and he put his arm around my chest. Both drained, we dosed off like that, warmed by each other's bodies and comforted by each other's breath.

We'd deal with the soiled couch later.


End file.
